Honduras Update - Fall 2015

May 2015 Newsletter - Meet the Team!

FINDING TRUE UNITY --when you share your gift.

Bureaucratic procedures are not my gift. I would love to pretend I am good at many things, but I know my limitations and I am best at creativity!!

So yesterday, I sat with tears in my eyes, at my kitchen counter with many notes in front of me, as I gathered my thoughts before talking to the guy named Mark, at the freight forwarding company in Washington, D.C., I paused in contemplation. At that very moment I felt complete inadequacy, about many things concerning this very important process. I just sat and starred. (Gathering all the logistics for the shipping container, which will leave the end of May is a TON of paperwork.)

Anyway…my sweet husband, who has owned several businesses, is very good at executive decisions, therefore he knows how to execute his ideas. He’s a wiz when it comes to business. However, yesterday, he walks up from the basement, from working on a draft that needs CREATIVITY and he says; “I can’t do this.” And with the most forlorn look on his face, which I haven’t seen since his son had a heart attack at age 39!  I asked; “Honey, what’s wrong?” He said; “I’ve got to come up with a creative idea for this event and I’m just not creative.”

I starred at him to see if he could tell that my face was as forlorn as his because of the insufficient position I was stewing in! (Women are more sensitive. Haha.)

I began to laugh at the role reversal, concerning our lives. He retired from owner/executive position in 2011, so he really doesn’t need to put himself in this sort of stress, but something is calling both of us to a much deeper and broader place in our lives than we have ever been, especially in our 11 years of marriage. I choose to get myself involved in many things which are sometimes unfamiliar areas and can also be so challenging to me that I find myself shaking my head in disbelief that I even care at all.   

But it’s the PULL that neither of us can explain. We want to be a part of something bigger than the both of us.

I said, “Honey, I can do creative for you, it’s who I am. But, could you help me formulate this whole conversation with this governmental issue?”

He said; “No problem, that’s nothing.”

I said; “That’s how I feel about strategizing your creative idea for your event!”

WE began to laugh. I cried and laughed at the same time, because it is so obvious that God is stretching us!

What I noticed most in this was unification, which is why I am choosing to write about it now. I saw true unity taking place, for both Charlie and I. For an executive mind, I can’t imagine how difficult it is to relate to a creative off the wall, mind like mine!

For the two of us to work on something together, it’s very rare and has hardly been a part of our daily agenda’s. I am not saying we are not supportive of each other. That would be far-fetched. It’s just strange that right now, we are being ‘forced’ to be more involved in each other’s calendar on a regular basis. That is rare for us. We are both very independent.

We laughed at the turn of the timetable and we found peace in knowing we purposely had each other’s back and there was no need to stress because together we will fix it!

January Newsletter--Written from a deep place within me.

DON'T JUDGE.....including yourself.

I had a dream last night that will not leave my mind! In this dream, I was very plain (something I am not) I had no jewelry and no makeup and no amenities of this life. Something I am definitely NOT! (Although I love going to third world countries, but I still like clean water to drink and to bath in.) No running water in this dream, no nice bed and people who were trying to dictate my lifestyle and reluctant to adopt any conveniences of this modern life, which we in the USA are so familiar with and can’t live without. (and if you say you can, you are kidding yourself! WE are spoiled.)

This dream got me to thinking about how much emphasis I might put on my appearance or how much I adorn certain areas of my existence in order to cover flaws. But, I am ok with covering flaws, because that comes with being a cosmetologist for 30 years! I’ve always been a creative thinker who adorns EVERYTHING.   I’ve been judged by my appearance and have received  “hate letters” anonymously, in my mailbox for appearing ‘rich’ (if people only knew how I ‘really’ shopped.) and they criticized me for seeming too focused on my ‘style’.

So this dream was a bit OFF and it was so widely diverse from whom I am that I began to ask God if He was trying to tell me something that I needed to know.

Do I focus too much on my appearance?

Do I ignore the people who need help and do not have the amenities of life like I do?

Are you pleased with me, God?

Why did I dream this dream?

I can tell you, GOD is not criticizing me, nearly as much as I can criticize myself. He created my mind and He created my nature. It’s me who has to align all of the junk that comes from the outside world and into my sub-conscience mind, because I am certain of His love for me, I see it clearly in HIS Word.

WE are way to hard on ourselves and we are way to critical of other people. We hear it all the time about judgment, but we still judge. I too, judge, but try DAILY to see people the way God sees them. I can tell ya, God does not see us the way we judge ourselves or the way we judge others. He sees His creation as complete. A finished work, marvelously and wonderfully made! (Psalms 139:14) He waits patiently for us to see ourselves the way He does. 

I remember at 5 years old, carrying around an open umbrella, not because it was raining, but because I loved the ‘fashion’ I found in Umbrellas. No body had to tell me to have a fashion conscience I just did, early in my life. Should I judge that? Yes, as long as it isn’t my total focus? For my friends who know me, they know me. For those who judge doesn’t mean they are necessarily my enemy, they are just less informed as to what creative minds are doing and thinking and quite possibly they have not stopped criticizing their own nature so it’s easy to do it to someone else.

How quickly do we judge what God has created?

When I saw myself in this dream as playing the part of an Amish type woman literally scared me. It caused me to wake up! I felt trapped and I felt I was not true to my character. In my dream I argued with the ‘community’ of people who tried placing their judgment on me for being flamboyant.  I based my argument of the very nature and emotion and FACTS of my loving and giving and gracious God!

Have you ever seen a Peacock or a Toucan or a white dove or a giraffe or a zebra or even an elephant? How about an octopus or a garden of red roses or a field of daisy’s or a mountain with white caps or an abundance of Canadian geese? Have you ever noticed the drama in the eyes of God? I have. I have seen the beauty in thousands of women in beautiful Sari’s walking barefoot on green, flowing grass of Nepali and India mountains and hills. I have looked out the window of an airplane and felt I could literally touch the tips of every mountain while flying into Katmandu.

I have walked through endless splendor of Colorado Aspen trees in the fall that literally took my breath away. I have seen and tasted and experienced the EXTRAVAGANCE of Gods masterpieces. I know the creativeness of the God who created me, and YOU. I WILL NOT JUDGE YOU for however plain you might be, because it’s beautiful in the eyes of the creator. Just don’t judge the charisma of the Ostrich or the Swan. We are all diverse and we are all something FABULOUS in the eyes of God.

I have touched a june-bug and I have witnessed the smell of skunks. I know the God who created all of it. Plain or beautifully complex.  

Have you ever read the book of revelation where John describes Heaven? It says that the beauty will be beyond our imagination! John said that the entire city would be transparent gold. He says the walls of the new city are precious jewels. The gates are twelve single pearls. The city itself and the streets are pure gold, yet like transparent glass. Revelation 21:18-21.

 I woke up scared to death in my dream that I was something other than myself. I won’t diminish my traits while I am completely awake now, just as I will not diminish those who live in a simpler way of thinking. I just want to be here to serve and give, only I will do it fully, ME. FULLY dressed, MAKEUP AND JEWELRY not to impress or to show off; it’s just me. I will not live in fear for who I am. If God adorns the earth and heaven, I am pretty sure HE ADORNS ME WITH HIS LOVE.

Just thought I’d share…….live true, live loving others and be who God has created you to be.

There is NO FEAR in the perfect love of God. (1John 4:18)

God and I will live to testify of your great love. Always.

My HEART bleeds.

My home state legalized Gay marriage. My heart truly bleeds for Oklahoma.

It’s like we are afraid to speak up in fear that we will look prejudice or that we are haters. But, it’s quite the contrary with me. In fact, if I do silence the TRUTH about the views of this ‘World’ that we live in, then I am doing and injustice not only to the human race in which God created, but I will also do an injustice to the GOD I say I love. He called me to love and to “Teach Truth as I was Taught,” not just because my daddy and pastors in and throughout my life taught me but because I began to see the Word of Truth by my own Spirit within me.

I am going to speak up because I love and I fear for the lives of those I care about (the many lives) as we approach “The End Times” (as the Bible says—). If the book of Hebrews says to, “‘spur’ one another on toward love and good deeds, and not give up meeting together as some are in habit of doing, but encourage one another all the more as we see the day approaching.” Then I feel that the ‘rights’ that this WORLD and all it’s “Legal” freedom speak out about, dictates that I no longer have a voice because I believe in the rights of the Biblical written Word of God.

I cannot be silent just as gays and homosexuals are no longer silent about how they feel and how they want to live and feel they have a right to stand for something they believe in. (ever noticed that there is a segregation, when we call them Gays and Homosexual’s? God and His love did not do that. Choices made, did that. I know I too once felt separated from my loving friends and Christian believers when I chose to be loose with my body and less with my FAITH in God.) I love ALL MY FRIENDS that profess to be gay in fact I have a niece that lives a gay lifestyle though I have never ‘heard’ her say to me she was gay. (But a tree that bears leaves that appear to be a fruit tree essentially will bring forth fruit.) (But even the thought of that can scare me for her, because Jesus cursed the fig tree for bearing fruit in the wrong ‘season’ and it goes on to say; “Heaven and Earth will pass away, but MY WORD will NEVER PASS AWAY.” In the end of all of this, and there will be an end, HIS WORD will stand taller than our fight for what we want to be right.

So here I am, it may not really be a SECRET since I post all the time about my love for God, but I also love passionately the stance I have with “Legal” TRUTHS of Gods standards. After all, the only reason there is a fight for “rights” is so that a standard can be set for a certain side. However with me, this in my ‘training’ to speak with love, but speak also with Truth.

Standards, Gods way, has been jeopardized by mans thinking and actions. What I know about choices, mine included, if a mind is not renewed and washed by the Word of God then it’s trumping the plan of God and forcing Gods standard to be omitted. Are we setting ourselves a trap? I know the Bible pretty well, I’m not a scholar, but according to Genesis, God allowed Abraham in to the city of Sodom and Gomorrah to observe the wickedness in those cities. I am leaning in toward the urgent request to ‘bargain’ with God for the sake of my friends!! GOD PLEASE SPARE US FROM OUR ‘RIGHTS’ WE ARE ALL FIGHTING FOR, FORGIVE US, BECAUSE WE HAVE TAKEN OUR EYES OFF OF YOU AND OFF OF YOUR PLAN, BUT INSTEAD WE ARE WANTING OUR OWN PLAN TO BE FULFILLED. GOD FORGIVE US!

What will happen if we continue to ‘fight for OUR rights’ which contrary to the Word of God? We will eventually reap a harvest in our lives. (I say, “WE” because even in my silence I too become guilty, if I do not declare what God created me to declare.) Sometimes that harvest is destruction.  

If there were no laws, which humans have constantly broken then there would be no need to fight for freedom, which essentially places us in bondage. BUT, God set a standard into motion when he set the laws into place because people were guided by their own sexual, immoral and fleshly desires, nearly always in and throughout this flawed world, we have broken the laws of God and yet, HE has GRACED us numerous times. (Thank God there is a Savior, His name is Jesus.)  From the beginning of time, Gods people, in Exodus 13 & through chapters 22), when they took their eyes off of God, they built their fate. When we fight for what is desired rather than desiring for what is SOUND DOCTRINE, then we will eventually set ourselves up for FAILURE.

I am not suggesting that you should not LOVE someone from the same sex in fact I have many female friends, whom I love. I have many male friends, whom I love. I am just asking you to delve a little deeper and stop looking for politics or Hollywood or even the agony of what drives someone to run to a distorted ‘truth’ to go back, quickly go back to the Word of God and remember that even God will EXALT his Word above EVERYTHING. Psalms 138:2

If He finds the significance in WHAT HIS WORDS say…..I am going to take it pretty literally that He must mean it.

I love you, I truly do…..but even as you, my gay friends are not silent about fighting for rights, I will stand behind you and fight for YOU, whom God created for a greater purpose than ‘rights.’

August 2014 Newsletter